Justified and the 21 Foot Rule

One of the recurring things from this season of Justified has been Danny Crowe wanting to prove his ridiculous 21 foot rule.  The first time it comes up is when he explains it to Kendall.  If you are within 21 feet of a guy with a gun and all you have is a knife, you should be able to charge and stab him before he can unholster and shoot.

This was also the first time that we see that Danny is kind of full of shit.  The Haitian (not the same one from Heroes) calls Danny out by asking if he has ever tried this theory out.  He then stares Danny down, who goes back to the bar, grabs a shotgun and kills the Haitian.

Two episodes ago, Danny asks DEA Agent Miller if has heard of it, he said he had and even is willing to allow Danny to give it a shot.  Unfortunately, Dewey decides to hit them both with a tow-truck.  I was curious to see if Miller could have won that match-up, he looked a little washed up.

The showdown finally happened between Raylan and Danny, who naturally asks Raylan how far apart they are standing.  Raylan says “about 20 feet” and Danny asks if Raylan ever heard of the 21-foot rule, to which Raylan responds that he has not.  Danny charges at him and then trips into a hole stabbing himself in the neck.  It was the most hilarious thing ever.

Raylan tried to give Danny fair warning.  He told him that he was a pretty damn good shot from much farther away.  Danny did not care, he just lost his dog and did not want to go to prison (which was actually one of the nicer things Raylan tried to do).

Apparently this is actually a real rule, although it is called the Tueller Drill.  The odd thing is that Raylan most likely has participated in this drill during his training with the U.S. Marshall.  They also did this on an episode of Mythbusters:

Goodbye Danny!  You were an idiot, but you were an endearing idiot.  He really did love his dog.  I guess that was a positive…

Author: Ngewo